OxfordPress.com

By ELEANOR RINGEL GILLESPIE
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Let me explain. In the movie "Adaptation," Nicolas Cage -- who produced "David Gale" -- plays twin brothers. One is a conscientious, talented screenwriter named Charlie. The other, Donald, is a carefree hack whose every bit of schlock is hailed as a masterwork by Hollywood.

Hence, Donald-ized, meaning that potentially good material has been Hollywood-ized.

But this movie is entirely fictional. It still has its really dumb parts, but at least screenwriter Charles Randolph was clever enough to come up with an interesting plot. Director Alan Parker has made some excellent movies ("Midnight Express," "The Commitments"), but he can go over the top -- and he may have left in or emphasized things another director would've cut or downplayed.

However, counterbalancing all that is the A-list cast: Kevin Spacey, Kate Winslet and Laura Linney. Spacey plays David Gale, once a respected philosophy professor at a Texas university and a leader in an anti-death penalty group called Deathwatch. Now he's sitting on death row for the rape and murder of a colleague in the movement.

Three days before his execution, he invites a hard-nosed New York reporter named Bitsey Bloom (Winslet) to interview him for two hours each day before he dies. The reason he chose her, he explains, is that she has a reputation for protecting her sources. Through flashbacks, he pleads his case to Bitsey, who reluctantly begins to think he may be innocent despite the seemingly open-and-shut case against him.

The movie is a mixed bag. There are adept twists and turns that hold your interest. Some plausible red herrings are tossed out. And there are a few blind alleys. But what are we to think when the climax depends on a faulty rental car?

And, yes, it is a polemic of sorts, but it can be pretty entertaining, thanks to the actors. Spacey is suitably enigmatic -- something he specializes in at this point. But the role also gives him a chance to try other things. He makes a heck of a believable fall-down drunk in some of the flashbacks.

Winslet is saddled with a character whose actions sometimes just don't make sense. Yet you stick with her because she is such an intelligent, focused actor.

Linney, in a smaller role, makes the most impact. This exquisitely beautiful actress has plain-Janed herself down to play Constance Harraway, Gale's close friend and the leader of the local arm of Deathwatch.

Portraying a woman who has no life outside her cause, she's as hard to recognize as Nicole Kidman is in "The Hours" -- and she does it without a fake nose (nothing against Kidman).

She makes a heart-wrenching confession to Gale: "I worked so hard not to to be seen as a sex object, and pretty soon you're not seen at all."

Disappointment can make a movie seem even worse than it is. Put these three stars together and add this director and you expect an awful lot. "David Gale" delivers -- just not as much as it might've.